Stolen Kisses

by Gray, Khardine

  Barabbas Antonella made his procession toward us with two guys I knew to be Manellos as his body guards.

  Fucking hell.

  I’d seen this man a few times in my life. There were two prominent times. The first was a glimpse at a bar in town. The next time was just last year and

  now this.

  He walked in like he owned the place and Claudius stepped forward.

  While I had to admit there was some element of fear that gripped my insides, Claudius stepped forward with that smirk on his face like he was greeting some old friend.

  “Barabbas Antonella, fucking hell. What breeze blew you to this part of town?” Claudius asked.

  Barabbas smiled and stopped just paces away.

  He looked like he’d just stepped out of The Godfather—very old school Mafioso La Cosa Nostra.

  A little like Marcus, but Marcus had modernized himself to some degree. Barabbas on the other hand had not and he did not look like he took too kindly to Claudius’ lackadaisical attitude.

  “You, scum. You are scum. At least Raphael knew his place and respected territory. You are just a boy.” He said to Claudius. “You are a boy and you think you can piss on tradition.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Claudius said then showed off the badass he was by stepping right up to Barabbas, into his personal space.

  “Don’t act like a fucking idiot. You want to play games boss boy, let’s do this.” Barabbas looked at me. He actually looked at me. “Sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong is never a good thing.”

  Fuck, he was talking to me and snapped me in gear. I didn’t give a fuck who he was. I waltzed right up to him and stared him down.

  “Got something to say? Say it or get the fuck out of here.” I pointed to the door.

  Even Claudius looked stunned by my words.

  Barabbas stepped around to me.

  “I just said it lapdog. Stop sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong. Since I didn’t expect you to understand I thought I’d send a message for you to see. It’s on the way to your house.” He chuckled and my bravado faded. “You may want to get there before everything goes Boom! Woman and child gone.”

  I would have beat the shit out of him, but adrenaline sent me straight to my bike. I jumped on it and rode out leaving them all.

  Boom …

  Like a fucking bomb.

  Before I even turned the corner three bikes joined me—Claudius, Gio and Alex.

  We all rode hard and fast to my house. Me praying nothing had happened to

  Maria and Flynn …

  What the hell would I do if something happened to them? Fuck!

  The usual twenty minute ride to my house took five minutes. We drove wherever we could cutting corners, jumping over hedges, anything to just get there.

  Thank God the house was intact when I got there.

  I ran inside and saw Saul, Donny, and Lois with Flynn sitting on the sofa.

  Where was Maria?

  “Guys there’s a bomb on the way here. Take Flynn into the basement.” I ordered.

  Saul grabbed Flynn and went off with him.

  Claudius and the others started checking around.

  The basement was what I had in mind to keep them safe. It was that old style set up so it could take a beating and protect you if there was a bomb. I had to think fast. Going outside was out of the question because maybe that was what they wanted so they could gun us all down.

  Maria ran down the stairs in blind panic.

  She looked like she’d been crying.

  “Dante, I have to talk to you. I have to tell you something now.” She babbled. She was talking fast the way she did when she was scared.

  “Not now baby, there’s a bomb. There’s a bomb either here or on the way. I need you to get down to the basement. The boys took Flynn down there already.”

  I grabbed her hand, but she pulled back.

  “Elliot Granger.” She blurted, her eyes wild and wide with fear. “It was him. It was him Dante. It was him who killed Christina.”

  “What the hell are you saying to me?” Elliot Granger was the governor. He was never on my radar.

  “Christina was seeing him and I saw him kill Todd Parker with Barabbas Antonella. In her treasure box your Ma gave me was a whole host of evidence against Granger linking him to all sorts of things. It’s the dirt. The thing was I knew about him and I’m so sorry I didn’t say anything before.”

  I stilled. Jesus Christ.

  The guys rushed back in looking at us.

  “What are you saying Maria? You saying you knew it could be him and you never said?”

  “No,” she shook her head. “I didn’t know. I never knew. Not till today. I saw him in the park earlier. He came and spoke to me and I guessed he knew you were investigating. He knew you were looking in the right places. I would never hide that from you, and that is why I’m telling you now. Because I know it was him. The stuff in the box is dirt enough to destroy him and if we’re going with that then it has to be him. I couldn’t just speculate, because Christina was seeing other people too. He’s dangerous and I was scared to get it wrong.”

  All I could do was stare at her while disappointment and hurt filled me.

  All I wanted for so long was a name, just a name and she had it.

  She had a fucking name all this time and had never told me.

  The glass smashing in on the floor to ceiling window stole my next words. A grenade dropped a few feet away from us and outside was the creeper from the charity.

  The creeper with the long pointed nose, greasy black hair, and distorted face. The fucker was right outside my house.

  Furious as I was the first thing I did was grab Maria and jump as far as I could into the hall while the other guys jumped out of the way.

  The blast from the explosion took down everything in its path.

  Chapter 28

  Dante

  As the walls crumbled the bullets started to fly.

  My head was spinning and my ears were ringing. Blood ran down Maria’s nose, but she was alright just disorientated.

  I was still so furious I couldn’t look at her properly.

  She had a name and never shared it with me. She saw me suffer and never once said she suspected this guy.

  I got up to go, to help the others.

  “Stay in here.” I told her.

  “Dante wait–”

  “I don’t want to hear it Maria. Of all the shit you’ve done to me to screw with my mind, this was the worst. You had a name. It doesn’t matter what you thought you should have told me. What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  “I was trying to protect you. I couldn’t lose you too. I didn’t know.” Tears spilled from her eyes, mingling with the blood that stained her skin, but I didn’t care .

  She reached for me, but I just turned and walked away.

  By the time I got outside most of our guys were standing. There were bodies all over the front lawn, but the fight wasn’t over. It didn’t look like Barabbas had sent many people.

  Who he sent was enough though. They came with a bomb and muscle.

  Claudius and the guys came around from the corner of the house.

  “The squads on it.” Claudius stated.

  I just looked to him, my hands trembling.

  “Hey man,” Gio began. “Cool off okay.”

  “Cool off!” I couldn’t believe he could tell me that.

  Cool off? I was mad as all hell, ready to breathe fire.

  I whirled around and marched up the stairs to the bedroom where I found the open treasure box.

  Maria had taken out all manner of pictures and shit from the box that was on the bed.

  Alex went over to the computer and whistled.

  “Holy fuck!” He cried and started tapping away at the keyboard.

  I went over to join him, looking at the files. They all looked shady as fuck, there was absolutely enough to run Elliot Granger into the ground. Liaising with
terrorists, rigging votes, and hiding evidence. This was all shit Christina had found.

  It grieved me that she was mixed up with a man like that.

  Jesus Lord.

  “Maria knew it was him.” I said more to myself than anybody.

  Claudius looked at me. “Dante, I’m going to tell you something you don’t want to hear.”

  “What? What are you going to say?”

  I was real interested to hear it.

  “She was right. She was fucking right.”

  My mouth dropped. “Are you kidding me?”

  “Nah, I’m not. The doll said she didn’t know and you knew as much as her that Christina was seeing different people. She just chose not to tell you about one of the guys, because fucking hell Dante he is dangerous. I knew of Elliot Granger and knew he was just as bad as Barabbas if not worse. He’s government Dante. He was above us then and he’s above us now.”

  “Would you have done what she did? Hold back information?”

  “Dante, I’m not her, and there are few people like me. But honest to God, I would have done the exactly the same as she did, because she’s acting now that she’s certain it’s him. We didn’t find out, we didn’t find shit and we weren’t going to. The names we got were like picking shit out of a hat and hoping for the best.”

  Part of me wanted to hear him out, but the other part wondered why she couldn’t have just told me what she saw back then. She had still left it out.

  No matter her reasons she had left something out and Elliot turned out to be the guy.

  I just couldn’t believe that we could have been so close and she didn’t think she could tell me.

  “So what now? I’m just supposed to accept that he’s above us. Accept Barabbas message. The man sent a bomb to my house intending to kill my girl and my child. I can’t just accept it.” I balled my fists.

  My girl and my child …

  But they weren’t really mine. They felt like mine and I could believe it until it killed me, but it still wouldn’t be true.

  Claudius surprised me by smiling. “Your girl and your child, when you cool off remember you said that. As for the other part of your question, I never back down and no one comes for me or mine unless I send for them.” He sneered.

  “Me neither,” Gio added.

  “What he said.” Alex jumped in. “Come with a bomb and I’ll catch it, throwing it back. Blood for blood man. Some of our men are on the lawn and there could have been even more lives at stake.”

  Claudius smiled wider. “Blood for blood. They don’t scare me bro. Not one fucking bit. I think however, since this is your fight I’m gonna pass the torch just for tonight. What should we do boss?”

  I stared at him wondering if he was serious.

  Me? Boss?

  I’d taken orders for so long that it was strange being in charge.

  I rested a hand on his shoulder showing my thanks.

  He nodded.

  “These people like to keep secrets. The mother fucker killed Christina so she wouldn’t talk. I think we should show the world what he was up to. Spread out all of the dirty laundry and hang it high. Then we find the fucker and kill his ass. Him and the little fucker who threw the bomb in my house.”

  Claudius smiled wide. “And how will we be going about this plan boss?”

  Now it was my turn to smile. I remembered something Christina had said once about the news. I didn’t watch it, hated it and thought it was full of inciteful stories.

  Tonight the people of Chicago would be in for a real treat when they found out what the governor of Illinois had gotten up to over the years.

  “Evening news has always sucked. Time to spruce it up don’t you think?”

  Gio laughed. “My what a tale to tell. I’ll get the squad on location hunting, tell them we want the governor.”

  “Let’s do this.”

  Gio was the first to go out the door, next was Alex then Claudius.

  I follow behind them, once downstairs I stopped when I saw Maria holding Flynn.

  Donny and Saul were with them.

  When she saw me she rushed up to me.

  “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “This doesn’t concern you.”

  “Please tell me, you’re going after him aren’t you?”

  “Maria, I don’t want to talk to you right now. I can barely look at you.” I didn’t care that I sounded like a complete asshole or that she looked at me like I was breaking her heart, my heart was broken.

  It was broken and I couldn’t see past all the pieces.

  “I love you.” She told me and another tear rolled down her cheek.

  This girl, this woman had mystified me my whole life. I would never dream of a reality where I’d gotten the girl I wanted and she just told me she loved me after all this time. She was with Luc, because like Gio said he was the fucking Porsche and I was the Volkswagen. The Alpha and the beta.

  She’d actually gotten married and chose the worst guy possible.

  All that time and I was there, always there.

  Always there, but not good enough for her. Now suddenly I was.

  I shook my head at her.

  Claudius was wrong.

  My girl and my child ... I didn’t have anything of the sort.

  I turned and walked away.

  I didn’t miss the crude stair Claudius gave me as I walked past him.

  I went out to the garage and grabbed my old bike. My good old trusty Harley that had been modified so many times I didn’t know exactly what to call it.

  It was just fitting to use it tonight.

  I needed something that could take a fucking beating, because I was out for blood.

  Elliot Granger’s blood.

  Chapter 29

  Maria

  He was the first man that I had spoken those words to and meant it.

  I actually meant it.

  I told Luc once in a roundabout sort of way. At the time I thought I meant it, but I knew he wasn’t mine. It was just something I said so he knew he could trust me. It was during a time when it was hard to trust anyone. Friends and enemies were practically the same thing.

  I also told Franco I loved him, but I said it because I was supposed to.

  I fell for him, and part of me loved him. Still there was something missing.

  I didn’t realize it at all until earlier when I told Dante.

  I didn’t realize that the thing that was missing in my life with everyone else I’d ever been with was they weren’t him.

  None of them were him, and somehow he completed me. He was everything for me.

  I was too late though.

  Too late and I was packing.

  Packing again to leave Chicago. This time I thought I’d travel light. Just a rucksack for me and Flynn with the essentials. I’d buy everything else when we got to where we were going.

  I thought this time we’d head west. To Iowa and then maybe on to Idaho. Just get lost in the mountains somewhere. Maybe that would be better than a city. It would certainly be better than coming here had been.

  God, I didn’t know what I was going to do, but that was the plan.

  It was my plan.

  Flynn was playing with his little soldiers and he had a little bag packed too.

  Donny and the other guys were still here, but I was going to slip out the back hopefully unnoticed. They thought we were up here asleep.

  I’d booked our bus tickets for eight. It meant we’d be travelling through the night just like last time.

  “Mama where are we going?” Flynn asked.

  “We’re gonna go somewhere fun. Lots of mountains with snow in the winter.”

  He frowned. “Why can’t we stay here? I like it here. Uncle Dante said I could live here.”

  I couldn’t break his heart and let him know his mother had managed to fuck everything up once again. Yet again I’d screwed up.

  I’d ruined it all with thinking I was doing the right thing keeping secrets, but
I wasn’t.

  Dante was so right. I should have told him. I should have said something to him all those years ago.

  I should have left it to him to decide what he wanted to do with the information. In my pursuit to protect him, I ended up damaging everything. In the end none of my reasons were valid.

  He saw it as me withholding information specifically from him. He didn’t get my point and I guess it was understandable. Even though I didn’t know for sure until today that Elliot was Christina’s killer.

  The fact that I had a name incriminated me.

  “Things change baby. Things happen.”

  Things happened and I wouldn’t want to be here when Dante got back. I didn’t want him to throw me out or ask me to leave. It would be worse than him looking at me the way he did with so much disappointment in his eyes when I’d told him I loved him.

  The thing was I almost knew what was down this road. I almost knew what would happen. It was why I had never wanted to work with him.

  My guilt over Christina’s death was always there, because I knew I couldn’t save her, and this thing today just made me feel worse.

  “It’ll be an adventure.” I added picking up the bag.

  We managed to slip out the back door. Once on the road I called a taxi that took us to the bus station.

  The good old bus station where I’d come in from Florida weeks ago. I didn’t think I’d be leaving so soon. This time with my heart broken in so many pieces. It would have been better if I’d gone somewhere else.

  It had just gone seven when we arrived so I thought it would be best to get Flynn something hearty to eat so it would hold him for the journey.

  We went into McDonalds. I ordered a happy meal with extra-large fries and ice cream.

  “Do you need the toilet?” I asked him and he nodded looking sleepy. I was glad, because that meant he would drift off as soon as we boarded the bus.

  I took his little hand and led him to the ladies.

  He’d gotten to that age now where he didn’t want me helping him so I allowed him to go in the cubicle by himself.

  When he came out to wash his hands someone came in, a man.